Lets say I have trained three advances in Ballistics skill and complete my first career.

Later, I change to another career that also has a Ballistic skill. Do I get to keep the previous three yellow dice in Ballistic skill from the first career and continue advancing Ballistics skill in the second career or do I start from scratch with no advances in Ballistics skill when I begin the second career? Thanks for any help!

Yes...when you change careers you copy all of your current stats onto a new character sheet. Once you transfer all of that, you then then are prepared to take new advancements in your career. Also, if you complete the career, you get to keep the "career ability" as well as gain a specialization in each of your former career skills.

PS: you may no this already and were just making an example, but you could not have trained 3 times in Ballistic skill during your first career. Training the second box only happens once you you have reached Rank 2 (10+ experience points)

limelight said:

Can you tell me what page this is on in the rulebook(s)?

You can only advance a skill once per Rank; however, you keep any advances you have taken when you change careers, so any previously trained skills are still trained. If the new career has one or more of the same skills as the previous career, you still cannot train it again until you have achieved the next Rank. Rank is based on XP so technically, you could start in a Career and train Ballistic Skill (for example), switch out of it without completing the career, and after attaining Rank 2, switch back and then train Ballistic Skill again.

Page 38 "managing a new career"

Also page 37 "career completion advances"

mac40k said:

Thank you very much. I have read and re-read the section on changing careers and I still can't get it - is there a page that specifies that you get to keep skill ranks when you change careers?

Page 34: "A character’s progress is tracked by both his career
and his advances. The character’s current career influences what
advances are available. The advances provide incremental improvements
to the character."

Advances taken are recorded on the character sheet and are permanent. Changing careers does not remove any previously taken advances, it only changes the advances available to the character. Note that when starting a new career you start with a fresh character sheet. This is only so that you have a clean slate on which to track advancements taken in the career. The front of the sheet should always reflect the current capabilities of the character, so you transfer over all of your Characteristics, trained skills, specializations, etc.

Also note that if you switch out of a career without completing it and later return to it, you can only take whatever advances are left on the character sheet associated with that career. In other words, if you used up your Skill training allotment before switching out for example, when you switch back you will not be able to train any further skills, but you could still take additional wounds, stance pieces, talents, fortune dice on primary characteristics, or actions that you hadn't previously taken.

What is the maximum skill level one can obtain for a given skill? Let's say I start at Soldier Career and get two ranks and pick Ballistic skill twice (the limit for Soldier Skill advances. I then switch to Hunter Career and advance to Rank 3 and then 4. The skill advance limit for Hunter is also 2 so may I train Ballistic skill two more times for a total 4 trained check boxes in Ballistic skill? Or are skills limited to a maximum limit of three trained check boxes for a particular skill? Granted getting to Rank 4 is going to take 20 to 40 play sessions...

The rules only say that each time you train a skill that you place a checkmark in one of the squares in the Trained column of the character sheet. Since there are only three squares for each skill, that strongly implies that the maximum number of times you can train a skill is three. Clearly, there is no place on the character sheet to indicate training in a skill for the fourth time. Although this maximum of three is never stated in the rules (that I can find), it is clear from the layout of the character sheet that this is what was intended. Perhaps the designers assumed it to be self evident and didn't think that it warranted spelling out in the rules.

The FAQ notes that the 5 boxes and two lines listed on the character sheet for non-career advances were intended as limits, but further states that the GM can change this if they wish their players to be able to purchase more than two non-career advances or advancements that require more than 5 advances to acquire. By the same logic, you can always allow characters to train a skill more than three times by creating your own character sheets. It's your game.

mac40k said:

This is starting to make much more sense. Since characteristic dice may be increased to a MAX of ten (according to the latest FAQ), it seems that yellow expertise dice are just extra bonuses for special boons, etc., but the characteristic ratings/dice carry the weight during a challenge roll - and may be converted to more powerful stance dice.

I think that the rules need to explicitly state that previously skill "trained" check boxes are to be transferred to a new career sheet (similar to moving previously purchased "stance boxes") when you transition to a new career. It is not obvious that this is the case given the current rules' wording.

limelight said:

According to the latest FAQ, the four basic fixed advances for career completion do not count against your career advance limits that are your options printed in yellow on the front of your career card - Example - I pick Soldier for my first career: I can train one check box of Ballistics at character creation, Rank 1.

At Rank 2 I can use the General Advances skill training and put one more check box of Ballistics for a total of 2 "trained" boxes in Ballistics skill. According to the 12/21/09 FAQ, using one of the four top fixed general advances does not count towards the Advance Option limits on the front of the career card (in this case, Soldier has "skill 2" advance limit - plus one more general advance skill increase option for a total of 3 possible skill advances for this career . Now I am at Rank 2.

Later, when I get to Rank 3, after earning 10 more XP, I decide to use an open advance as a skill advance and take a third "trained" check box of Ballistic skill. Now I have used up all my advance limit for skill increases, plus the fixed skill general advance (see FAQ) for Soldier and I now have three "trained" check boxes in Ballistics as a Rank 3 Soldier.

Anyone disagree with my understanding of the rules here?

Trained skills are recorded on the character sheet, not a career sheet. The career sheets are the pre-printed cards that show what the Primary Characteristics are and what skills can be trained in that career. The character sheet is also where you record the PCs characteristics, wound threshold, special abilities due to race, etc. The rules don't explicitly tell you to transfer over all these things to the new character sheet when you change careers either, but of course you do this as well.

mac40k said:

I meant character sheet - will edit.

I think that the rules need to explicitly state that previously skill "trained" check boxes are to be transferred to a new CHARACTER sheet (similar to moving previously purchased "stance boxes") when you transition to a new career. It is not obvious that this is the case given the current rules' wording.

...edit

Tang86 said:

Your understanding is fine as long as you presume that you are bouncing in and out of the Soldier career as you gain experience. If you remained in the Career, you would use up all the advance slots and have to transition to something else long before reaching Rank 3 (20 XP).

Tang86 said:

I disagree. I'm not trying to be rude, but I think it is obvious to anyone that thinks about what the checkbox means. It means that the character has trained in the use of that skill. There is nothing in the rules that states or implies that by changing careers you lose previously gained training. If that is what they intended, they surely would have said so. The fact that they didn't implies that of course, you transfer the checkboxes along with your Characteristics, Fortune dice, Specializations, etc. What would make you think that you wouldn't and what would be the rationale for losing the training?

mac40k said:

Why can't I save up my experience points as a Soldier career until I have earned enough for rank 3 (20) and then spend them first on advances for skill increases, in this case Ballistics? The remaining advance slots could be used up for other skills or what have you and the leftover experience used immediately to transition to a new career, spending the excess XP on the career transition cost (if any) and new advances for the second career.

Where in the rules does it say that you must spend experience points on advances as soon as you earn them? Sorry if I missed this in my rules reading.

Indeed you don't have to spend your experience as soon as you get it, but the only reason why someone would save up experience is to get a stat increase.

If you save up xp just so you can get two ranks in a skill at once, then you're just gimping his character. Why not spend your xp and when you've finished your career, go to another career who gives you the opportunity to get the same skill.

The system is designed to allow characters to improve in some small way after every game. While there is nothing mechanically forcing you to spend XPs as they are earned and you could wait until you had 20 XP before you take your first advancement, what would be the advantage of this approach? Why would you want to play a starting character with no improvements for 20 sessions while the other PCs are gradually getting better all along only to then suddenly improve significantly one day? Its almost like you'd be trying to force a "Levels" concept on the system. You need to not focus on whether or not it is possible to do it by the RAW and use some common sense. Saving up your experience until you had 20 would serve no purpose other to validate that you could do what you had suggested. My previous response was written with the apparently incorrect assumption that you would be spending XPs on advancements as you earned them. So yes, you are correct. You can do exactly as you said. It just doesn't make any sense to me why anyone would want to do so.

mac40k said:

After seeing this and the previous post I see that it would be better to change careers when needed and to advance each time I get XP. What is odd is the fact that I would have to pop in and out of a career in order to get the max number of skill advances in a particular skill (Ballistics in this example) in the career that I want to game with (Soldier in this case).

Perhaps if more related careers are released for Soldier to progress to such as Sergeant, Captain, Knight, etc. then it will be more to my liking. Certainly not a show stopper though.